A Coroner has ruled that a drunk 25-year-old Devonshire man died when he lost control of his cycle when negotiating a bend in Smith's Parish.

And before giving his condolences to Yusef Hewey's family, Coroner Archibald Warner said: "We can all keep repeating and repeating it and hope people would learn from these unfortunate accidents. People must stop drinking and driving.'' Mr. Warner ruled that Mr. Hewey died after trying to negotiate a bend on Harrington Sound Road, Smith's Parish, shortly after 5 p.m. on July 6 last year.

Mr. Hewey was the tenth of 18 road fatalities in 1998.

Last year an eyewitness said the stretch of road where Mr. Hewey died was a frequent accident spot.

Mr. Warner heard Government Analyst Kevin Leaske's report that Hewey had 368 milligrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood taken from his body. The legal limit is 80 milligrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood.

Witnesses testified he had been drinking the day before and was seen at a relative's home just an hour before the accident drinking.

Mr. Hewey was described as "feeling nice'' but not drunk and incapable.

Mr. Leaske also found .08 grams of benzolidocine, a cocaine by-product, in 100 millilitres of blood.

But his colleague, Christine Quigley, reading in his report, claimed she could only say he had taken cocaine at some time before the accident and could not say how much he had consumed.

Tammy Berkeley said she was travelling west on Harrington Sound Road when she rounded a blind bend to find Mr. Hewey on her side of the road headed east at high speed.

Ms Berkeley swerved to the inside and the pair avoided a collision, but her passenger, Lyndell Williams, turned and saw Mr. Hewey laying in the road behind them.

Police crash investigator Ferdinand Thorne said Hewey scraped the wall back on his side of the road before hitting a Bermuda stone moongate jutting beyond the wall by four inches.

The moongate had cracked and been jarred in the collision with Mr. Hewey's brake lever and handle bar. He and the cycle fell to the road.

Mr. Hewey had extensive "road rash'' to his left side Mr. Warner heard, but died from a tear to his aorta which led to massive bleeding.

The aorta is the largest artery in the body and leads oxygen-rich blood from the heart to the rest of the body.

Crash driver was over the legal limit It is also on the left side of the body. His left lung had also collapsed.

P.c. Thorne said there was no physical evidence why Mr. Hewey lost control of the cycle, nor was there sufficient evidence to show what speed he was travelling.

When Mr. Warner asked P.c. Thorne to comment on evidence that the man had four times the alcohol limit, the traffic officer pinned the blame for the accident on alcohol.

He said: "Your Worship, from my experience in dealing with impaired drivers, who have blown considerably less than 368 milligrammes of alcohol, it can be said they are very poorly able to control a motorcycle.'' The investigating officer, P.c. Terrylyn Paynter, said several people saw Mr.

Hewey drinking and driving that day "yet no one stepped in to advise him not to ride his cycle''.

And she had recommended warning signs on Harrington Sound Road to the Police Commissioner in her report, but added: "However, due to the condition Mr.

Hewey was in from the alcohol, road improvements would not have made much of a difference.''